Executive Summary

Introduction

Natural resources - fuels, materials, water and food commodities -
form the basis of all human activity. They are the essential inputs to both
subsistence economies and the most advanced technological societies. Resource
consumption in the world is rising rapidly, driven by population growth and
rising wealth. Technological change and urbanization also fuel consumption, by
creating new patterns of human needs and aspirations. In recent years, much has
been written about the environmental and social impacts of modern consumption
patterns. Many studies have focused on the environmental damage caused by the
consumption patterns typical of industrial economies - high fossil fuel use,
polluting emissions and waste volumes. Others detail the environmental
degradation which can be induced by poverty - soil erosion and desertification,
deforestation, water contamination. Developmental studies have highlighted the
inequality of consumption levels between industrialized and developing
countries, and between rich and poor inhabitants within countries.

This report adopts a different perspective, and seeks to place
consumption at the center of policy-making for socio-economic development and
ecological sustainability. Through a survey of broad resource use trends over
the past 30 to 40 years, it demonstrates how both the level and distribution of
consumption have changed radically in many parts of the world. By presenting the
best available forecasts of consumption over the next ten to twenty years, it
makes clear just how much more we will have to coax the earth to provide. Past
and future consumption trends are then placed in their environmental context:
what pressures have our consumption habits placed on the earth's capacity
to provide the goods and absorb the wastes? What emerges from this analysis is
that fundamental changes are taking place in global biological processes. Our
attention has perhaps been focused too much at the local and regional level - on
specific polluting emissions, or loss of specific habitats and species - and too
little on whole ecosystems. Our understanding of how complex ecosystems function
remains relatively limited, but the evidence of serious disruption is now
widespread. Chronic, human-induced imbalances in major biological systems - for
example, nutrient cycling, inter-species relationships and food chains - are
more insidious than acute incidents of pollution or other damage. Their
consequences, however, may be much harder to reverse, and more serious for the
developmental and security prospects of every country.

Consumption Trends and Ecosystem Impacts

The report examines consumption trends, and the associated impacts
on natural ecosystems, for three key resources - food (cereals and meat), wood
fiber, and fish. These resources have been selected because they are of
universal importance and interest to countries in all geographic regions and
income groups. Additionally, consumption of all three is rising everywhere and
demand is being fuelled in part by basic needs such as nutrition and literacy,
not merely by "lifestyle" preferences. Finally, none of these
resources is easily substituted. Demand management and technological advances
can therefore do only so much to slow demand: consumption will inevitably
increase in coming years.

Cereals and Meat

World cereal consumption has more than doubled in the last 30
years, while meat consumption has tripled since 1961 and is increasing at a
linear rate. The agricultural success story is that rising demand has been met;
more people are now better fed than they were a generation ago. One of the many
environmental consequences, only now becoming clear, is significant disruption
of the global nitrogen cycle. In the past half century, the application of
inorganic nitrogen fertilizers world-wide has increased more than ninefold, and
the number of livestock has more than doubled since 1960. Fertilizers and animal
manures have increased and concentrated, respectively, the amount of nitrogen
entering soils, freshwater and marine ecosystems. Human activity has actually
doubled the natural annual rate of nitrogen fixation, and by far the largest
single cause is agriculture.

Most agricultural experts believe that increasing global demand
for cereals and meat can be met, and forecast that grain production will rise by
about 15 percent by 2010, and by 25 to 40 percent by 2020. More fertilizer will
be needed to produce the additional cereals and fodder crops for animals.
Looking ahead just 12 years, if current practices persist, global fertilizer
consumption will increase by at least 55 percent by 2010. In some
under-fertilized regions, such as South America and Africa, this could be an
entirely positive development. In others, notably parts of South and East Asia,
nitrogen saturation will approach the levels already experienced in northwestern
Europe and parts of the United States. The incidence and severity of nitrate
contamination of drinking water, ground-level ozone formation, crop damage,
forest die-back, and damage to coastal fisheries from algal blooms
("red" and "brown" tides) can all be expected to
increase dramatically.

Wood fiber

Global wood consumption has risen by 64 percent since 1961. Demand
for fuelwood and charcoal rose by nearly 80 percent and more than half the
world's wood fiber supply is now burned as fuel. Consumption of sawlogs,
veneers, pulp for paper-making and other industrial forms of wood fiber rose by
nearly 50 percent over the same period. Rising demand for industrial wood has
encouraged widespread planting of industrial plantations and, today, they
account for nearly 25 percent of supply. However, the bulk of wood fiber for all
uses still comes from old-growth or secondary-growth forests. Demand for wood
fiber is a major, though by no means the only, cause of deforestation.
Commercial logging has accelerated the clearance of old-growth tropical hardwood
forests; since 1960, more than one-fifth of the world's entire tropical
forest cover has been removed. Logging is also the primary cause of conversion
of old-growth coniferous forests in temperate regions to managed forests with
more uniform structure and lower biodiversity.

Demand for industrial wood fiber is projected to rise by between
20 and 40 percent by 2010. Most forestry analysts expect that demand will be met
at the global level, but that regional shortfalls will occur, leading to higher
fiber prices. If current patterns of production are not changed, pressure of
demand will result in supplies being drawn from the world's last remaining
"frontier" forests. The tropical forests of the Amazon and
equatorial Africa and the boreal forests of Siberia and Canada will not survive
in their current form. Projections of future woodfuel consumption range more
widely, due to poor data and uncertainties over the difference between what
people actually consume and what they would consume, if their needs were
fully met. Consumption might rise by only 1 percent by 2010, if supplies are
constrained by lack of availability. Consumption could more than double, if
constraints were removed. Many studies predict that critical shortages will
affect parts of Africa and Asia, unless more effort is made to establish
woodfuel plantations.

Fish and Fishery Products

Consumption offish and fishery products (such as fish meal and
fish oils) has risen by 240 percent since 1960 and more than fivefold since
1950. Intensive fishing effort has led to the collapse of many important
commercial fisheries in the northern hemisphere and pressures are now mounting
on southern fisheries. Overfishing, pollution, and disturbance of marine
habitats have reduced the productivity of many coastal zones, where some 90
percent of the world's fish harvest is caught. Marine harvests offish
appear to have peaked and now account for a declining share of total production.
Aquaculture, or fish farming, has become increasingly important and now provides
more than one-quarter of all fish destined for human consumption.

Demand for food fish is projected to increase by at least 34 per
cent, and probably by nearer 50 per cent, by 2010. Analysts are virtually
unanimous that this level of consumption cannot be met if current production
trends continue unchanged. The world's few remaining productive fishing
grounds will be fished out in their turn and total marine harvests are expected
to fall from today's levels. Aquaculture production, even under the most
optimistic growth projections, would not be able to fill the gap. Scarcity will
cause fish prices to rise and encourage more international trade. This, in turn,
will favor subsidized industrial fishing fleets which supply relatively wealthy
markets, at the expense of small-scale, subsistence fishers. Nearly one billion
people, most of them in developing countries, currently depend on fish for their
primary source of protein. This source is likely to dwindle away within a
generation. The outlook for food security and employment among low-income
coastal countries could hardly be more serious.

Opportunities for Change

These three examples from the agriculture, forestry, and fisheries
sectors demonstrate how current practices are undermining the biological systems
which support key renewable resources, exploiting them in such a way that
potentially everlasting supplies are being depleted. Other examples could have
been chosen: fossil fuel use is changing the global climate, water engineering
projects have profoundly altered freshwater habitats. In many cases, wasteful,
inefficient or short-sighted production and consumption patterns are putting at
risk whole ecosystems, disrupting their normal functioning and reducing their
potential productivity, now and for the future. This is perhaps the most
unsustainable aspect of human economic activity today.

This report also looks at the possibility of change through policy
reform. Policy interventions can be made at the point of resource production, or
at any point in the processing and distribution chain, or they can target
end-use behavior by the consumer. The report reflects these differences among,
and within, the sectors under discussion and suggests where policy interventions
might be most effective in each case.

Policy Directions for the Next Decade

In the case of food consumption, some reduction of consumer demand
for meat might be possible, particularly where per capita consumption is high
enough to generate some health concerns. Greater public awareness of
over-fishing and destructive fishing practices could influence which fish are
consumed and how they are caught, at least among wealthy consumers. Equally,
consumer concerns over tropical deforestation could further develop the market
for sustainably produced hardwood products.

The wood fiber sector offers considerable scope for efficiency
improvements, if regulatory and economic incentives are applied. Technological
advance has already improved the efficiency of fiber utilization and enabled
some substitution of non-wood materials. The proportion of wood fiber which is
recovered during processing and manufacture, and the percentage of paper made
from recycled fiber have risen impressively over the past 30 years and could
rise further.

However, the drivers behind rising food, fish, and fiber
consumption are in large part fundamental: a growing population's need for
adequate nutrition and literacy (paper consumption has risen faster than any
other use of wood), energy, and shelter. Woodfuels and construction timber can
certainly be substituted but not, realistically, within the time frame covered
in this report. Grain and fish for direct human consumption can hardly be
substituted at all, especially in rural economies. The demand curves projected
for the next decade are not likely to be altered much. Given this reality, the
report urges a reorientation of production methods.

Agriculture: Currently, well under half the nitrogen
applied to crops world-wide in fertilizer is actually utilized by growing
plants. The rest becomes a pollutant, wasting farmers' money and imposing
heavy costs on society in terms of clean-up requirements and lost productivity.
Animal manure, rather than substituting for inorganic fertilizers, is
increasingly added to them, or simply disposed of as a waste product. Economic
and regulatory incentives for more timely and efficient use, research which
improves understanding of fertilizer application and uptake by crops,
agricultural extension and outreach programs which encourage farm management
practices to reduce nitrogen run-off are all urgently needed so that food
production can rise without further contamination of soils, water supplies, and
coastal zones.

Forestry: In theory, the world's entire current demand
for industrial wood could be met from intensively-managed plantations covering
an area equivalent to less than 10 percent of today's natural forests -
even after allowing for extensive environmental protection measures. In
practice, a very substantial part of the forecast increase in consumption could
be supplied from plantations, if legal protection of old-growth forests were
strengthened, forestry management standards were tightened, thus raising costs,
and financial incentives for plantation establishment, and good management, were
increased. Community plantations to provide fuelwood have proved successful in a
number of developing countries and represent the most realistic short-term
policy option until rising wealth enables the transition from woodfuels to
commercial alternatives.

Fisheries: Again in theory, the world's oceans are
estimated to be capable of providing a sustainable annual fish catch 17 per
cent, or even 24 per cent, higher than 1996 levels. This can be achieved only if
international agreements to protect declining fish stocks are honored and if
individual countries improve the management of their national fisheries. The
capacity of the global fishing fleet is currently at least 30 per cent, and
possibly 150 per cent, greater than is required to catch the current annual
harvest. Economic packages which phase out incentives to enter, or continue in,
an over-capitalized industry must be implemented more widely, along with
adequate compensation for fishers who abandon the profession. Substantial
technical and financial cooperation among governments representing industrial
and artisanal fishing interests will be required. Equally importantly, stronger
pollution control and conservation measures should be enforced to safeguard
marine habitats, particularly fish spawning grounds in coastal areas.

Conclusions

It is notable that, in thinking about more rational ways of
meeting demands for key natural resources in the future, it is necessary to
think about the entire use cycle, from production to final consumption and
disposal. It is also notable that no line can easily be drawn between the
developed and developing countries. Consumption is rising in every major world
region, although at different rates; ecosystem damage is occurring in many
regions, although it has progressed further in some; the economic and social
impacts are being felt by people everywhere, either directly in their daily
livelihood or, less directly, in the form of higher prices and reduced quality
of life.

The scenarios for 2010 presented in the report are daunting. At
the same time, they are not inevitable. The purpose of this report is to suggest
that rising consumption needs can be met, but that they should be met in more
imaginative ways. The possible solutions set out in the following pages utilize,
for the most part, familiar policy concepts and currently available knowledge
and technologies. Imagination is required only to summon the will to put them
into effect. Attempting to meet the world's future consumption by simply
doing "more of the same" will accelerate ecosystem degradation and
will undermine the very productivity we are striving to
increase.